


ghosts of past loves

by jdphoenix



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post Episode: s03e10 Maveth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 21:12:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5390636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her hip stings from the tackle, as does her shoulder, and she imagines her chest will be one giant bruise soon. But it’s better than being shot, which is what Ward got for pushing her out of the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ghosts of past loves

**Author's Note:**

> Major spoilers for 3x10. I deal through denial.

Jemma’s adrenaline is still high from the gunfire and the running and the overall peril when they reach the Playground. She’s mostly uninjured but several others are and, though she’s allowed her medical skills to languish in recent months, she takes a patient for herself. It’s a simple gunshot wound, a few superficial abrasions as well as ample bruising, nothing out of her comfort zone, but the patient himself is out of _everyone’s_ comfort zone.

“Thank you,” Ward says in the quiet tone that’s become his norm since the spring.

“I am merely sparing the other medics your presence,” she says coolly over the snapping of her gloves. “Shirt,” she orders and he obediently strips it off, wincing when his arms move higher than his head.

Try as she might to focus on her work, to ignore him, it’s impossible. This close she can see every familiar scar as well as the unfamiliar, hear the slight rattle in his breath that she privately attributes to Coulson crushing his ribcage. And it’s utterly impossible, at this distance, to ignore the weight of his stare.

“Are you okay?” he asks while she administers a local anesthetic.

“It will take more than you to rattle me,” she says, keeping her eyes on her work.

He doesn’t touch her, but she can feel his palm hover briefly at the elbow of her sleeve. “I mean, you didn’t get hurt?”

She finally meets his eyes and regrets it instantly. He’s always so _sincere_ since he was freed from Maveth’s control - in a completely different way than he was prior, either on the Bus or in the Vault or even afterward when he took pleasure in toying with them. The subtle signs of manipulation she trained herself to see in him are gone and she has yet to find his new tells. It’s disconcerting.

“I hit you pretty hard,” he adds when she doesn’t respond.

Her hip stings from the tackle, as does her shoulder, and she imagines her chest will be one giant bruise soon. But it’s better than being shot, which is what Ward got for pushing her out of the way.

“I’m fine,” she says tightly as she presses the needle through his skin. He can’t be numb yet, but he makes no complaint.

He _never_ complains. He’s like a passive participant in his own life. After they drove Maveth from his body and were left with the unpleasant surprise of a very alive Ward, he’s gone quietly along with their lead. When the team argued - loudly and over his sickbed - about whether or not to put a bullet in his brain, he simply laid there. When the mission last month went sideways and Hunter accused him of betrayal, Ward took the beating without protest.

He has rare moments of personality, but those are few and far between. For the most part he seems little more than a shell left behind in Maveth’s absence.

And perhaps the worst thing is that that’s all they keep him for. Not his skills as a specialist, which they do use nonetheless, but his wealth of knowledge retained from his days as Maveth’s puppet.

“Good,” he says and seems to mean it.

His eyes are still on her. He’s lost all pretense of social grace and either doesn’t know or doesn’t care that he is, as Daisy described him last week, a creeper. Perhaps that’s what drives her to ask the question that’s been weighing on her since long before he saved her today.

“Why did you do it?”

This isn’t the first time he’s gone out of his way to protect her. He’s done it for the others as well, but she doesn’t think he clutched any of them to his chest or searched them, wild eyed, for signs of injury. He certainly didn’t stare so unceasingly afterward. He watched her for the entire ride back to base.

“Because I love you.”

The stitch she’s making tightens too much and tears right through his skin. Neither of them pay it any mind.

“You … _what_?” she demands shakily.

“I love you,” he says again, like it’s the simplest thing in the world.

She rests one hand on the cold table beside them and the shock of it lends her some stability. “ _No_ , you don’t. And I don’t appreciate-”

He smiles, and it’s so rare these days that the sight steals her voice. “I’m not lying. I’m not playing you.” He tips his head to one side, so like his old self. “But I get why you’d think that.”

“You _tortured_ me,” she says softly. Her free hand goes to her side, to the ragged scar he left. It’s not the only one but it’s by far the worst.

His eyes drop to the spot and his hand covers hers. “I know. And I don’t-” He frowns and meets her eyes. “I remember that. I remember your blood and your screams. I remember all of it, just like I remember what it was like to pull in nets full to bursting with fish and hunt wild boar with my brothers and watch gladiators fight to the death in the arena.” He brushes a stray lock of hair from her temple. “Just like I remember the way you smiled talking about your father and the stars or the sound you made when you broke apart in my arms.”

She tears her hand from her side and takes a shaky step back. “ _Stop it_ ,” she says and hates herself that it comes out pleading.

Ward deflates a little. His smile turns sad, but it’s still there and she could be wrong - she _has to be_ wrong - but she thinks it looks a little like Will’s.

“I remember his whole life, same way I remember Josiah’s or Erich’s or Atretes’.”

“That doesn’t mean you love me,” she says. “Those people aren’t _you_.” Will was good and brave and never would have willingly hurt someone. He was nothing like Ward.

“Why not? I may not have their bodies but I have everything else. Everything that’s left of them is in me. I remember loving you the same way I remember loving Kara. It doesn’t feel any different to me.”

“It _is_.”

He smiles and grabs a bandage off the counter. His arm still needs a few more stitches, and at least one extra one after she tore a new hole in it, but he slaps the square of gauze over it and hops off the stool.

“I know that I hurt you and I know you hate me, but I know you love me too. I can wait for you to figure that out.” He makes to go, but thinks better of it and faces her again. “Just so you know, I was okay. At the end. I knew you’d made it home and I was okay dying if it meant you got that.”

He slips out, unnoticed amid the flurry of activity surrounding those more seriously injured, except by his guard of the day, who falls into step behind him at the door. Jemma lays her hands on the table and drags in deep breaths while she waits for the pain in her heart to lessen enough that she can stand on her own power.

 


End file.
